This Day in History

Date: 09 December 2020 - 21:18

News ID: ۸۵۲۹۵

(December 10)

Today is Thursday; 20th of the Iranian month of Azar 1399 solar hijri; corresponding to 24th of the Islamic month of Rabi al-Sani 1442 lunar hijri; and December 10, 2020, of the Christian Gregorian Calendar.
1054 lunar years ago, on this day in 388 AH, the lexicographer, literary figure, and theologian, Abu-Ali Mohammad ibn Muzaffar al-Hatami al-Baghdadi, passed away. He has left behind numerous compilations, including the book "al-Hatamiyah”, which is a critical account of poems of his contemporaries.
822 solar years ago, on this day in 1198 AD, the famous Spanish Muslim philosopher and polymath, Mohammad Ibn Ahmad ibn Rushd, known to Medieval Europe as "Averroes”, passed away at the age of 72, while on a visit to Marakesh, from where his body was brought back to Spain and buried in his birthplace Cordoba. He was an expert in the sciences of the day, including medicine, astronomy, jurisprudence, Qur’an and hadith, at a time when the Christian World was living in ignorance and darkness. At the age of 25, he conducted astronomical observations in Morocco, discovering a previously unobserved star. He gave one of the first descriptions on sunspots. Ibn Rushd made remarkable contributions to medicine. His well-known book in this field is "Kitab al-Kulliyaat fi’t-Tibb”, whose Latin translation known as "Colliget” aroused much interest in medieval Europe. He has thrown light on various aspects of medicine, including the diagnoses, cure and prevention of diseases. He was called "the jurisprudent philosopher” and as a follower of the Maliki School, he compiled a summary of edicts (fatwa) of previous jurists. His works include interpretation of Qur’anic concepts. Ibn Rushd’s most important original philosophical work is "Tahafut at-Tahafut” (Incoherence of the Incoherence), which is a refutation of the Iranian Shafei theologian, Ghazali’s "Tahafut al-Falasefa” (Incoherence of the Philosophers).
754 lunar years ago, on this day in 688 AH, the Mamluk Sultan of Egypt, Mansour Qalawoon liberated Tripoli in northern Lebanon from the Crusader occupiers. His victory led to gradual liberation of Syria and Palestine from the European usurpers.
694 lunar years ago, on this day in 748 AH, Hassan Gangu titled Zafar Khan, was unanimously elected king with the title Ala od-Din Shah Bahmani, following his victory over rivals, who two years earlier had joined together to declare the Deccan (or south India) independent from the tyrannical rule of Sultan Mohammad bin Tughlaq of Hindustan (or northern subcontinent) by placing Naseer od-Din Ismail as the Shah at Daulatabad. Ala od-Din Shah Bahmani, who claimed descent from the pre-Islamic Iranian king, Bahman son of Isfandiyar, shifted his capital further south to Gulbarga, and expanded his kingdom in all directions during his 11-year rule. The dynasty he founded ruled for over 170 years – first from Gulbarga and then from Bidar – promoting Islam and Persian language, culture and architecture in southern India, by virtue of its direct sea-route contact with Iran, from where poets, scholars, artists, statesmen, traders and soldiers of fortune flocked to the Bahmani court. The Bahmanis respected Sufi saints and greatly revered Shah Ne’matollah Wali of Kerman for his devotion to the school of the Ahl al-Bayt of Prophet Mohammad (blessings of God upon him and his progeny). The Bahmani Empire – that stretched from the western to the eastern coasts of Peninsular India – split into five independent Persianate kingdoms that ensured the independence of the Deccan for another 170 more years until the conquest by the Moghal Emperor. Of the five, the three powerful dynasties (Nizamshahis of Ahmadnagar, Adelshahis of Bijapur and Qutbshahis of Golkandah-Haiderabad) followed the Shi’a Muslim creed and regarded the Safavid rulers of Iran as their emperor.
605 lunar years ago, on this day in 837 AH, the prominent Iranian poet of the Timurid era, Seyyed Moin od-Din Ali Hussaini Sarabi Tabrizi, passed away. He wrote mystical treatises and a collection of poems including ghazals.
510 solar years ago, on this day in 1510 AD, Portuguese invaders, led by Afonso de Albuquerque and a fleet of pirates under command of the local mercenary Timmayya (Timoji), seized the port city of Goa on the western coast of India from the Bijapur Dynasty of the Deccan, founded by the Iranian adventurer from Saveh, Yusuf Adel Khan. Earlier Goa was part of the Bahmani Empire founded in 1347 by the general of Iranian stock, Ala od-Din Hassan Bahman Shah.
190 solar years ago, on this day in 1830 AD, American poet, Emily Dickinson, was born in Amherst, Massachusetts. After her death in 1886, more than 1,700 of her poems, which she had bound together in bundles, were discovered and published.
124 solar years ago, on this day in 1896 AD, Swedish chemist, Alfred Bernhard Nobel, died at the age of 63.
119 solar years ago, on this day in 1901 AD, the Nobel Prize Awards were distributed for the first time in Stockholm, Sweden, in accordance with the will of inventor Alfred Nobel.
72 solar years ago, on this day in 1948 AD, the International Human Rights Declaration was ratified by the UN General Assembly. It is made up of an introduction and thirty articles, with Article I referring to the equality of all mankind. The realities, however, are different. The big powers have a selective and dualistic approach to human rights, which are practically used as tools by the West to impose political and economic pressures on independent countries.
67 solar years ago, on this day in 1953 AD, Abdullah Yusuf Ali, Indian-born Sunni Muslim scholar and translator of the holy Qur’an into English, passed away in London, and was buried at the Muslim cemetery at Brookwood, Surrey, near Woking. His best-known work is "The Holy Qur’an: Text, Translation and Commentary”, published in 1938 in Lahore. Unfortunately, in the later, revised editions of this book, the author’s notes on the exclusive God-given virtues of the Ahl al-Bayt of Prophet Mohammad (SAWA) – Imam Ali (AS), Hazrat Fatema Zahra (SA), Imam Hasan (AS) and Imam Husain (AS) – have been removed, including those pertaining to ayah 107 of Surah Saffat, where Abdullah Yusuf Ali had explicitly mentioned in his original work while explaining the term "Zibhin Azim” (Great Sacrifice) that ransomed Abraham’s offering of Ishmael: "This was the type of service which Imam Husain (AS) performed, many years later in 60 AH, as I have noted in a separate pamphlet.” This and similar remarks by the author on the merits of the Ahl al-Bayt have been erased and are not found in the distorted editions of his work that are available today.
42 solar years ago, on this day in 1978 AD, the Nobel Peace Prize was scandalized in violation of the will of Swedish inventor Alfred Nobel, by awarding it jointly to notorious terrorist Menachem Begin (premier of the illegal Zionist entity), and Egyptian president Anwar Saadaat, for his treason against the Palestinian cause by signing the disgraceful Camp David Accord under US auspices.
39 solar years ago, on this day in 1981 AD, prominent religious scholar and Friday Prayer Leader of Shiraz, Ayatollah Seyyed Abdul-Hussain Dastghaib, was martyred by a MKO terrorist while on his way to the weekly Friday Prayer. He has left behind a large number of valuable writings, including an exegesis of several surahs of the holy Qur’an.
26 solar years ago, on this day in 1994 AD, Ayatollah Sheikh Abdul-Hussain Gharavi passed away at the age of 84. A product of the seminaries of Qom and Najaf, he was a staunch opponent of the despotic Pahlavi regime and rallied the people of Tabriz. Following the victory of the Islamic Revolution, the people of East Azarbaijan Province elected him as representative to the Assembly of Experts.
25 solar years ago, on this day in 1995 AD, prominent jurisprudent, Ayatollah Mirza Kazem Tabrizi, passed away in holy Qom at the age of 75. He was a prolific writer and authored several books including the 50-volume "Qawa’ed al-Fiqhiyya” (Ruler of Jurisprudence) and the 20 volume annotation of Shaikh Horr-e Ameli’s "Wasa’el ash-Shi’a”.
14 solar years ago, on this day in 2006 AD, Iran opened an international conference on the supposed Holocaust in Europe during World War 2, calling for a scientific and academic probe of the alleged genocide of the Jews. The move was widely welcomed and attended by scholars from all over the world to the dismay of the illegal Zionist entity called Israel, which owes its terrorist birth in Palestine to the myth of the Holocaust.